


What the Meek Inherit

by Ophelia Coelridge (daemonluna)



Category: Hard Core Logo (1996)
Genre: Closeted Character, Dysfunctional Family, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2001-06-30
Updated: 2001-06-30
Packaged: 2017-10-14 05:34:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,243
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/145921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/daemonluna/pseuds/Ophelia%20Coelridge
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Billy's mother is neither blind nor stupid.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What the Meek Inherit

It's wrong.

Margaret sees how that Joe boy looks at her Billy, and how Billy looks at Joe, and she _knows_. Even if they haven't done anything yet, it's wrong and it's evil but Billy looks at Joe, and Joe looks at Billy and it's all just a matter of time.

Billy came home late from school today, and she could smell the cigarette smoke in his hair and on his clothes. She didn't say anything. Drawing attention to it would only make it worse, she knows this. But she still sees the way they _look_ at each other.

And she can't say anything, because if they haven't--she doesn't want to give them _ideas_ , but... Billy's a good boy. Her little blonde boy. He was supposed to turn this house into a home. He was supposed to turn this farce into a marriage. And a mother shouldn't think these sorts of things, but underneath it all, she can't help but be disappointed. In him. In her husband, 'til death do them part, God willing. In herself, for wanting something more than laundry and dishes, potluck dinners and church socials, a surly teenage son and an uncommunicative husband who can't even pick up his own damned socks... She takes a deep breath.

Billy will forget all this adolescent foolishness, in time. He'll finish high school, and find a nice girl, and settle down. Get married. Have a family of his own.

And maybe he and his wife, (who will bring the grandchildren over, and ask her advice about morning sickness and swap recipes for chocolate chip cookies), maybe they won't talk, not really (God knows he gets it from his father), and they'll argue over things that aren't really what grates at either of them (because isn't that what everyone does?), and at night they'll be in the same bed but as far apart as if one of them were on the moon, and the silence will be more welcome as the years go by. But at least that's normal, and that's the way it always has been and always will always be.

She wants the best for her son, after all. Isn't that what every mother wants? What _she_ wants... She's going to be late if she doesn't hurry. She checks her stockings for runs, her teeth for smudges of wayward lipstick, and makes sure she hasn't lost an earring.

"The casserole is in the oven, take it out when the timer goes off," she tells her family. "I'll be home before nine. Billy, don't forget piano practice. Half an hour. At least."

Billy, of course, ignores her. He ignores everything except that Mulgrew boy these days. But he's a good boy inside, really, and all this is just a phase. Charles barely raises a hand in farewell. She has the feeling that if she took her car keys and started driving and just forgot to turn around and come back, they'd only notice she was gone because supper didn't magically appear on the dinner table.

But no, she tells herself. She has a house to keep and a husband and a son to take care of. It's what she does. It's what gives her life meaning. She loves them. And maybe she speeds just a tiny bit, but she makes it to the Sunday school teachers' meeting on time.

Angela's there, of course. Angela's always there. As she's handing out the minutes of last week's meeting she looks up, fair-haired and fresh-faced, and smiles. Margaret smiles calmly back. At Angela. At Maureen, the bitch who stole away her age five and six class. At Mrs. Lawson, who is half-blind and mostly deaf, but still puts the fear of God into the eleven and up's.

She wishes someone would put the fear of God in her. She wishes she were scared enough, or strong enough, to just sit and smile and spend the evening cutting out paper lambs and palm branches for the bulletin board outside of the nursery.

But she's not.

They sit, and they gossip, and they glue fluffy white cotton onto the construction paper lambs. Clara Stevens passes around hot tea in mismatched tea cups from the church kitchen. Margaret offered to get it, but Clara, tucked back in the corner with her nervous stammer and shy smile, had jumped up first.

Eventually, they run out of cotton balls.

"I'll go," says Angela, standing and smoothing her skirt.

"I'll get you the keys to the supply closet," says Margaret. Her palms are sweating.

Her low heels tap out a brisk staccato as Angela follows her down the hall. She retrieves the keys from the desk drawer in the office, and unlocks the storage room. Angela follows her inside, and shuts the door behind her. They both hear the lock click shut, but Margaret still has the keys firmly in hand. The bare bulb overhead snaps on, revealing metal shelves stocked haphazardly with crayons, white glue, and a stack of tattered old hymnals.

"We shouldn't--" Angela starts.

"I know," Margaret agrees, and kisses her desperately.

When she pulls away, they are both short of breath. Angela's hair is drifting loose from its neat braid in fine wisps. Margaret's pale pink lipstick is smeared across her collarbone.

"This is wrong," Margaret gasps, fingers deftly unfastening the pearl buttons on Angela's blouse.

"It is," Angela agrees, and moans as Margaret leans forward and takes one peaked nipple carefully between her teeth through the modest lace and cotton bra.

"We should stop," Margaret says softly, turning her head, cheek resting against the curve of Angela's breast.

"Don't you dare," says Angela, steel in her voice, but her hands are gentle as she traces carefully manicured nails lightly down Margaret's back.

"I can't, you know that," she whispers, and buries her face in the crook of her lover's neck.

"I know." She cups her face in soft hands, and kisses her deeply. Margaret kisses back needily, and presses her up against the unpainted wall. She can feel Angela's small, firm breasts (still girlish despite the preschooler and the five-year old waiting for their mommie at home), and the heat between her thighs as Angela pushes a knee between her own legs. Angela rocks against her hip once, twice, three times, and her body trembles, mouth open in a surprised little "o."

"Oh, Peggy," she sighs. The regret in her voice is heartbreaking.

Margaret is gasping for air, still pushing against her. Angela slides a furtive hand beneath her skirt, bunched up around her thighs, and strokes the damp cotton. Margaret sobs, and comes.

"Hush." The younger woman soothes her like a fevered child, stroking her hair and kissing her flushed cheeks.

"This is wrong," Margaret says again, softly. But she is weak. They're both weak. She knows what happens next. It will be what always happens.

They will button and tuck and straighten their clothes, smooth back disordered hair, and wipe away tell-tale lipstick. Finish the fool's errand they set out on, and return to the classroom, chattering on about Nathan's first tooth, and Charles's promotion.

They will arrange to meet for coffee later in the week, and go back to the houses and the people who profess to need them.

And Margaret, tight-lipped, will watch her son stare longingly at his best friend and know that her own sins have been visited on the next generation.

It's wrong.

And it's all her fault.


End file.
